1. Prologue/Chapter 1

The assignment for all freshmen on the first day: write a brief summary of your life so far, due during homeroom the next day. I had no clue what they would use such a pointless assignment for, but I certainly wasn’t happy about an assignment on the first day. On top of it all, I would actually have to do this one, instead of handing it off to the class geek. I wasn’t sure what I would write, either. I was the resident beauty queen; the most adorable baby, the cutest preschooler, and three-time winner of the Little Miss Forks contest. Looking good and being the best was my life. There really wasn’t much to write without sounding conceited. I wasn’t conceited. Everyone liked me and wanted to be like me, and they were a freak if they didn’t. I just had to prove it.

The difference between confidence and arrogance is whether you can back it up.

I could back it up.

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Geometry; Mrs. Jones, room 15. It was the top class on my schedule, the first thing I would have to endure that morning. I despised math—none of it made any sense to me. I knew nothing would be different about this math class since I couldn’t even figure out the map telling me where it was. I needed help, desperately, but I couldn’t look desperate. It was my first day of high school for goodness sake, and I sure as hell wasn’t going to look like an idiot. Swinging my hips the way they say to in Seventeen, I walked over to a cute guy who looked to be a few years older than me. Time to ask for directions.

“Hey,” I said sweetly, with a sly smile on my face. “Um, I’m supposed to go to room 15 for geometry right now, but I really don’t know where it is. Could you help me find it?” I batted my eyelashes for extra effect, and he nodded along. Sweet, easy success.

“Sure, right this way,” he responded, and I followed along next to him. We made small talk, nothing exciting, but I learned that he was a sophomore, and that he played on the J.V. football team. Not bad, but I could do better. We were just outside of building 5, apparently where my class was, when I saw a very excited Jessica coming my way. I wasn’t really sure what to do, but was leaning toward avoiding her—and the embarrassment of people knowing I was friends with her. It was too late, though; she jogged up to me, and at that point it was obvious we were friends. At least in her mind.

“Omuhgoshomuhgoshomuhgosh!” She exclaimed, all of her words blending into one. She was really keyed up about something; I couldn’t help but wonder what. Probably something silly, like Mike being really tan after a summer down in California, Angela growing another foot taller, Tyler making the football team, etc. Something I would pretend to be excited about for her sake, and get over the second she was gone. None of it mattered; none of it was surprising. There was never anything exciting around here, aside from what went on around me. That was always exciting.

“Lauren! Oh. my gosh. Oh, my gosh. Oh, my GOSH!!! So there are these new kids from Alaska, oh my gosh, you have to see them. They’re all like, incredibly gorgeous. Three guys, two girls. I haven’t seen the girls yet, but the guys are incredible. Like absolutely, jaw-dropping, drooling for hours on end amazing. Better than Orlando Bloom, I swear! I saw them, and I was like, oh my gosh!” I let her ramble on a bit while it all sank in. Five new kids. Three supposedly really hot guys, though the hot part is hard to rely on with Jessica’s taste. I didn’t care about the girls; I could beat them out anyway. But if these guys were as hot as Jessica said, I might have found what I was looking for. I needed to see this for myself, but first I had to get to geometry. I said goodbye to Jessica and hurried down the hallway into the classroom. While looking for my seat, I realized that the guy I’d been talking to had completely disappeared. I didn’t care—if Jessica was right, he couldn’t even compare to these new guys. Three more shots at finding my dream guy. And if I wanted one, I’d get him.

Geometry dragged on for a little over an hour, not that I paid attention to anything the teacher was saying. I tried to guess what these guys looked like. Blonde, maybe? Tan? Probably not, they were from Alaska. I gave up in frustration after a few minutes, hot guys that were pale with dark hair? I didn’t trust it. Jessica had bad taste anyway; she was probably the only one in the world who thought they were attractive. I rolled my eyes and moved on, counting down the seconds until the bell rang for me to go endure World History instead of geometry. Once the bell rang, I sprang from my seat and made it outside to walk to building four for World History, right across the green. I saw Angela on the way across, and she waved at me. I smiled in return, but frowned inside. Angela and I would never be close—ugly and quiet was so not my type. Surprisingly, though, she walked up to me.

“Hey, Lauren,” she said, aiming for conversation.

“Hey, Angela. What’s up?” I tried to be nonchalant, acting like we were actually friends, and grinned.

“Just saying hi. I’m guessing Jessica told you about the new kids?”

“Yeah, shocker. She said they were really hot or something…I don’t know, her taste is a little sketchy.” Angela laughed.

“She’s not wrong; they’re gorgeous, all of them. And they were pretty nice. One of the girls, Alice, was in my last class. She was so pretty, and so sweet! Very quiet though, she wanted to stay low-key I guess. Well, I should be going, got to get to class. See you later!” She smiled as she walked away. I was nervous; this Alice girl couldn’t be that pretty, could she? Not competition for me, no way. There was no way. I walked to my next class, found a seat next to Tyler, and passed notes for an hour. He didn’t mention the new kids once, thank goodness, and we just talked about our summers until class ended. We both had English next, and walked to class together. He had grown a lot over the summer and was definitely pretty hot, and seemed interested. I wasn’t sure what was going to happen, though—if the guys would sweep me off my feet, or if he would be drooling over the girls. It was nerve-racking.

The bell rang, announcing that it was time for lunch. Emotions mixed inside of me; excited about new, possibly hot guys, curious about the new girls, worried they would be prettier than me. In the end I wasn’t nervous; there was no way someone gorgeous enough to beat me out could end up in Forks. I’d probably just find some people that were almost cool enough to be friends with me, and finally escape from Jessica. I made my way to the cafeteria, Tyler still dutifully behind me, checking out my ass. I had some butterflies, but didn’t, couldn’t, wouldn’t let it show. As I stepped into the cafeteria, I had no trouble finding the new kids.

It was better worse than I expected.

Jessica was right; three incredibly hot guys, and Orlando Bloom would look hideous next to any of them. One was really built with dark hair, another tall and sort of lanky with reddish hair, and the last tall, fairly built, and blonde.

They were stunning, and so were the girls. I didn’t know which one was which, but I guessed the small one was Alice. She was small and chalky with short black hair, yet she looked like a model. The other girl was the bigger problem. Tall with perfect curves; pale, flawless skin, and long wavy blonde hair. She was the most beautiful person I had ever seen.